Hopes of gaining factory backing for either the Prodrive or Rafanelli 550 GTs have been firmly dashed as Ferrari have decided against involvement. They will also not develop their own racing version of the 550 Maranello. It is thought that they will wait for the new F60 before deciding on a GT racing programme and, in any case, it is likely that the marque Maserati will be favoured for production-based racing versions.

Luca di Montezemolo has said in the past that the 550 would never race but the privately-developed cars have been showing good form in the European GT Championship. Both teams were invited to demonstrate their cars at Fiorano a few weeks ago and the Prodrive team in particular were hopefull of gaining official backing to produce a series of customer race cars.

Prodrive's project manager George Howard-Chappell was disappointed at the decision and said: "There has been huge interest [from potential customers] but we will need to see if that has eroded while we have been negotiating with Ferrari".

Lack of factory backing will be a big disappointment for Prodrive

Click here to return to the Ferrari Happenings page.